What is Amptify and How It Can Benefit Your Hearing

Hearing aids can restore our access to sounds that we were unable to hear, but there is a crucial part of how we hear that can't be helped with hearing aids. When we experience hearing loss, the loss is typically very gradual. By the time we usually seek help because we are aware of experiencing more and more difficulty hearing, specifically understanding conversation, many changes have already occurred in our brains that make processing conversation more difficult. 

The changes that occur can:

• Slow down the processing of speech 
• Affect our ability to remember or store what we just heard 
• Make it more difficult to hear the fine details in speech  
  

These changes directly result in more effort needed to listen, changes in our memory and a lack of confidence that we have heard accurately.   

Developing and Strengthening

This difficulty is very common with many. And sometimes this processing difficulty may occur without the presence of a hearing loss. The best news is that these are all skills that we can strengthen. Very specific exercises that are designed just for improving our speed at which we process sounds, our memory, and the ability to listen for the fine details are all available to you. Developing these skills occurs because we are developing and reinforcing neurologic pathways. 

When these skills are stronger:

• Listening becomes easier 
• We notice that we are more focused when listening 
• Our confidence is restored  

Hearing Loss Weakens THREE Brain-Based Skills

• Auditory Memory
• Sound Processing
• Ability to Discriminate Sounds

The Good News

With auditory training, you can slow down, stop, and even reverse brain-based hearing complications. Auditory training strengthens your brain’s neural pathways through exercising them. This improves your:

• Auditory memory
• Sound processing speed
• Sound differentiation (i.e., processing different sounds at noisy restaurants and parties)

About Amptify

Amptify is a specialized program developed by Nancy Tye Murray, PhD of Washington University. This program uses a series of games played on a smartphone, laptop or tablet. You can play anytime, anywhere and for any amount of time. The games are engineered to be fun, challenging and each are targeting specific skills. The games become more challenging as you improve. 

Optimal hearing is made up of two parts, our ears and our brain. Amptify strengthens what we do with what we hear! Think of it as training for our brains.

This ‘training’ is especially important for:

• New hearing aid users 
• Users who are challenged in noise 
• Users who can hear, but have difficulty keeping up with conversation
• All of us who seek optimal performance in noise, focused listening and enhanced memory  
  

Doctors of Audiology, Kirsten McWilliams, and Elizabeth Barragan are very excited to introduce Amptify to the Hearing Solution community. They both believe that the listening skill developed with Amptify will result in confidence, improved focus in noisy environments and improved accuracy.  

Please contact Elizabeth to learn more about the Amptify Program and how you can start improving today!